Thomas Jefferson to Richard Randolph, 25 January 1814

To Richard Randolph

Monticello Jan. 25. 14.

Dear Sir

Will you be so good as to send me two gross of your beer jugs; the one gross to be quart jugs, and the other pottle do. they are to be delivered to a mr William Johnson a waterman of Milton, who will apply for them about a week hence. mr Gibson will be so good as to pay for them on your presenting this letter. they should be packed in crates, or old hogsheads
or such other cheap package as you use. Accept the assurance of my
esteem & respect.

Th:
Jefferson

PoC (MHi); at foot of text: “Mr Richard Randolph”; endorsed by TJ.

Richard Randolph (1782–1859), the eldest son of David Meade Randolph and Mary Randolph, of Tuckahoe, visited TJ at Monticello in September 1808. Five years later he established a stoneware factory a dozen miles east of Richmond on the James River in Henrico County. By 1816 Randolph’s two-story “Potters Shop” was valued at $1,200. In 1822 he sent TJ six barrels of waterproof shale cement, a substance discovered by his father, and asked the ex-president for his opinion of it. Unfortunately, TJ found that “in every instance this cement dissolved on being put into water,” and he was consequently unwilling to use it either at Monticello or for the construction of the University of Virginia (William G. Stanard, “Randolph Family,” WMQ description begins William and Mary Quarterly, 1892– description ends , 1st ser., 9 [1901]: 250; Randolph to TJ, 10 Jan. 1809 [ViW: TC-JP], 18 Mar., 30 May 1822; Richmond Enquirer, 22 Oct. 1813; Vi: Mutual Assurance Society, policy no. 1955 [29 Mar. 1816]; Washington National Register, 23 Aug. 1817; MB description begins James A. Bear Jr. and Lucia C. Stanton, eds., Jefferson’s Memorandum Books: Accounts, with Legal Records and Miscellany, 1767–1826, 1997, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Second Series description ends , 2:1384; TJ to Randolph, 13 May 1822; Richmond Enquirer, 18 Apr. 1828).

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